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Digital meets Art in small town India
Director – Surajit Sarkar
The Catapult Arts Caravan is a video+arts performance group that has been bringing together the creative abilities of local artists, theatre and musicians with digital audio and video technologies in public performances in Madhya Pradesh and the North-East since June 2004. In the tradition of the night long ‘Jatras’, the Caravan shows have been vibrant, interactive forums for audiences, with rich artistic and cultural expressions of contemporary events, local history and the surrounding environment.
Consequently, there have been demands to complement these shows and carry forward their energy and content to larger audiences. Hence, we at Catapult have developed the idea of setting up interactive digital exhibitions/installations in local community halls, colleges and schools. This will be accompanied by a website carrying textual, video and audio information on the local environment and history. Support to research and develop the exhibition template, as well as initiate the website is being provided by the Daniel Langlois Foundation and the Oboro Media Lab in Montreal, Canada.
Beginning early 2007, the Caravan would like to use this template to set up a series of such installations on local themes in Central India. Already a magnet for local artists and tech-savvy youth, the Caravan performances and proposed exhibitions, are intensive Arts+Technology training modules. Here, a generation of artists, performers and enthusiasts from the small town milieu use digital technology to manipulate images, sound, text and movement to create content that engage users and viewers alike.
The Catapult Arts Caravan is now looking for equipment and funding for personnel and exhibition costs. As the exhibitions and performances continue and new content accumulates, it is planned that subsequent versions of the exhibition and updated website be carried out by trained local talent. Because, ultimately it is about bringing digital technology into what is loosely called “folk wisdom”, a kind of knowledge we so often borrow from, but rarely give back to.